Creative processes - The British School at Rome

Creative processes
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Creative processes
Curated by Marina Engel at the British School at Rome, “Meeting Architecture” investigates on
collaborations between musicians, artists, filmmakers, writers and architects. Starting with Caruso-St
John and Demand, a highly successful example of what architects and artists can produce.
Architecture / Francesco Garofalo
Author
Francesco Garofalo
Sections
Architecture, Reviews
Published
12 November 2013
Keywords
Adam Caruso, British School at Rome,
Madame Wu and the Mill from Hell, Marina
Engel, Mario Codognato, Meeting Architecture,
Nagel House, Peter St John, Royal College of
Art, Thomas Demand
Network
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Location
Rome
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The Adam Caruso, Peter St John and Thomas Demand
collaboration is viewed as a highly successful example of what
architects and artists with complementary sensitivities can
produce when the work is founded on mutual respect and
shared curiosity.
https://www.domusweb.it/en/architecture/2013/11/12/caruso_st_john_demand.html
14/11/2013
Creative processes
Pagina 2 di 14
This review of a conversation held at the British School
at Rome asks why this may not necessarily be a reassuring and
tranquil interpretation, at least in terms of the architect’s role in
this relationship.
British School at Rome, view of the exhibition “Adam Caruso and Thomas Demand, Madame Wu and the Mill from Hell” (29 October – 19
November 2013). First appointment of “Meeting Architecture”. Photo Daniela Pellegrini
At first sight, the “Madame Wu and the Mill from Hell”
exhibition seems to confirm the expectations. The walls of the
room feature a print reproducing the curtains from the 2009
exhibition at the Neue Nationale Galerie in Berlin, in which
Caruso and St John solved the problem of carving out spaces in
the transparent Mies pavilion without constructing walls. This
mechanism allowed Demand’s works to acquire distance and
created sequences, averting the risk of ending up in the
basement where they often exhibit 2D works that do not adapt
to the suspended panels Mies adopted from the first. The two
architects found their desired historic reference for their 2009
exhibition in the 1937 Mies and Lilly Reich textile exhibition
and, with a large Thomas Demand work exhibited down the
long side of the room, Rome really can be said to have recreated
the essence of the Berlin exhibition.
https://www.domusweb.it/en/architecture/2013/11/12/caruso_st_john_demand.html
14/11/2013
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British School at Rome, view of the exhibition “Adam Caruso and Thomas Demand, Madame Wu and the Mill from Hell” (29 October – 19
November 2013). First appointment of “Meeting Architecture”. Photo Daniela Pellegrini
The second project is Nagel House, a design they
developed together for an art and architecture competition in
Zurich. Instead of adopting the repertoire of landscape
architecture, urban furnishing and paving patterns – and, most
crucially, avoiding anything that resembled a public-art project
– the three decided to construct a replica of a famous Chinese
house that withstood the demolition process until it found itself
sitting precariously on a scrap of land, before then being
destroyed. Were this “stubborn nail” to reappear in the centre of
Zurich, it would be underneath the large reinforced-concrete
viaduct across Escher-Wiss-Platz.
The idea of turning it into a Chinese restaurant and
hanging paper lampshades from the viaduct soffit lent
substance to their clear strategy. Although approved and paid
for, the project was never completed because those opposing it
played their cards well on the table of bureaucracy and the
media. It was then buried once and for all by a referendum,
although lost by the narrowest of margins.
https://www.domusweb.it/en/architecture/2013/11/12/caruso_st_john_demand.html
14/11/2013
Creative processes
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British School at Rome, view of the exhibition “Adam Caruso and Thomas Demand, Madame Wu and the Mill from Hell” (29 October – 19
November 2013). First appointment of “Meeting Architecture”. Photo Daniela Pellegrini
The third project appears more conventional. After years
of successful collaboration, the artist asked the architects to
refurbish his house at Hellmuhele outside Berlin. This
impression is also reinforced by the presentation of the project
in lovely b/w photographs by Hélène Binet and two books of
impeccable working drawings.
https://www.domusweb.it/en/architecture/2013/11/12/caruso_st_john_demand.html
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British School at Rome, view of the exhibition “Adam Caruso and Thomas Demand, Madame Wu and the Mill from Hell” (29 October – 19
November 2013). First appointment of “Meeting Architecture”. Photo Daniela Pellegrini
The complexity of the exhibition starts to become
apparent in the adjacent room, during a two-hour conversation
chaired by the influential and soft-spoken Italian curator Mario
Codognato.
Despite featuring different types of collaboration, all
three projects challenge architecture’s claim to lend form to a
space precisely when they do so very successfully. It is
important not to misconstrue this point: it is precisely because
Caruso and St John’s work is so specific and of such good
quality that the dilemma emerges in all its, almost
philosophical, clarity.
First, there is the issue of exhibition design. Adam
Caruso told the story of their exchanges, which commenced
with a request from Thomas Demand to solve the problem of
the exhibition at the Fondation Cartier – once again, a
transparent building and the risk of being relegated to the
basement. Problem Solving is the title of a short text by the
architect that can be read on the walls of the Rome exhibition.
https://www.domusweb.it/en/architecture/2013/11/12/caruso_st_john_demand.html
14/11/2013
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British School at Rome, view of the exhibition “Adam Caruso and Thomas Demand, Madame Wu and the Mill from Hell” (29 October – 19
November 2013). First appointment of “Meeting Architecture”. Photo Daniela Pellegrini
It is far from being an indication of false modesty and,
more often than not, the problem to be solved is an absence of
“space”. So, the richly decorated and “untouchable” rooms of
Palazzo Pitti prompted the construction of outsize pieces of
furniture to be used as exhibition devices. In Zumthor’s
Kunsthaus in Bregenz, the curtains were moved to form an
enclosure within the open space of the gallery.
During the conversation, Demand complains that
architects (in general but not the one sitting beside him) see
artworks as objects in a room and not as ideas so Caruso and St
John’s ability to find a solution without resorting to
conventional architectural features may be the reason for
working together. To use the artist’s words: “I stopped
pondering and just let them do their part. Results were mostly
baffling and I kept thinking a good while about them, even if I
believe I got the proposition right away.”
https://www.domusweb.it/en/architecture/2013/11/12/caruso_st_john_demand.html
14/11/2013
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British School at Rome, view of the exhibition “Adam Caruso and Thomas Demand, Madame Wu and the Mill from Hell” (29 October – 19
November 2013). First appointment of “Meeting Architecture”. Photo Daniela Pellegrini
Is the house a more normal situation? Not entirely.
Demand says he loves the location but that he did not need a
country house. He was not really sure how to use it and, in
short, he did not see it as a home. Other factors made the
project far from simple: the original mill structure has been
there for centuries but during the Nazi period it was given a
“rustic” appearance that the heritage service was anxious to
preserve. This paradox did not deter the architects, who subtly
dismantled the inner structure while restoring its surface.
https://www.domusweb.it/en/architecture/2013/11/12/caruso_st_john_demand.html
14/11/2013
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British School at Rome, view of the exhibition “Adam Caruso and Thomas Demand, Madame Wu and the Mill from Hell” (29 October – 19
November 2013). First appointment of “Meeting Architecture”. Photo Daniela Pellegrini
Last come Nagel House and its “clever move” on the
chessboard of public space. This proposal, while questioning the
arrogance of architecture and conventional public-art practices,
actually managed to create even greater friction. Does the
absence of a sense of humour in Swiss right-wing populist party
explains the defeat of this intelligent project? You have to
visualise it, constructed and after some time has passed. The
unusual lie of the house beneath the viaduct would suggest to
passers-by not familiar with the story that, in some generic way,
the house preceded the infrastructure, as was the case in the
original Chinese reference.
Italy abounds, often unintentionally, with such
situations. Not far from the British School, the site of the
MAXXI museum designed by Zaha Hadid was created in 1998
by casually separating two army barracks, but a house inhabited
by stubborn Italian-army residents remains trapped within the
museum shell. This may seem a parallel of Nagel House and a
perfectly successful one, because not designed. Architecture is
very present as a discipline in this partnership, precisely
because of its absence.
https://www.domusweb.it/en/architecture/2013/11/12/caruso_st_john_demand.html
14/11/2013
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British School at Rome, view of the exhibition “Adam Caruso and Thomas Demand, Madame Wu and the Mill from Hell” (29 October – 19
November 2013). First appointment of “Meeting Architecture”. Photo Daniela Pellegrini
The conversation, however, brought more. Adam Caruso
spoke eloquently of the modern rhetoric on transparency and of
their attempt to re-establish the fundamental dialectic between
interior and exterior. The endless discussion on art spaces was
updated with illuminating comparisons drawn from the
experience of private gallery design and the differences with the
complex programme created, for instance, for Nottingham
Contemporary.
https://www.domusweb.it/en/architecture/2013/11/12/caruso_st_john_demand.html
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British School at Rome, view of the exhibition “Adam Caruso and Thomas Demand, Madame Wu and the Mill from Hell” (29 October – 19
November 2013). First appointment of “Meeting Architecture”. Photo Daniela Pellegrini
It will be fascinating to follow the rest of the “Meeting
Architecture” programme, curated by Marina Engel in
collaboration with the Royal College of Art, in the hope that it
may provide openings for criticism, as has this first event, in
which the brilliant dialogues was flanked by a captivating
installation. The programme will progress in the coming years
and six initial events have already been arranged. They focus on
architecture again (Reinier De Graaf), art again (Vivien Lovell),
films and architecture (Amos Gitai), and music and architecture
(David and Peter Adjaye, Cecil Balmond and Daniel Libeskind).
Other events involving Eric Parry and Richard Deacon, Wouter
Vanstiphout, Richard Sennett, Thomas Schütte and Alfredo
Pirri are an indication of input from the rich British cultural
scene, albeit not exclusively so. The programme’s aspirations
also reflect the role now played by the British School as a venue
for events relating to architecture and other disciplines in
Rome.
https://www.domusweb.it/en/architecture/2013/11/12/caruso_st_john_demand.html
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British School at Rome, view of the exhibition “Adam Caruso and Thomas Demand, Madame Wu and the Mill from Hell” (29 October – 19
November 2013). First appointment of “Meeting Architecture”. Photo Daniela Pellegrini
Until 19 November 2013
Madame Wu and the Mill from Hell
Meeting Architecture. Architecture and the Creative
Process
British School at Rome
Via Gramsci 61, Rome
Author
Francesco Garofalo
Sections
Architecture, Reviews
Network
Like on Facebook
Keywords
Adam Caruso, British School at Rome,
Madame Wu and the Mill from Hell, Marina
Engel, Mario Codognato, Meeting Architecture,
Nagel House, Peter St John, Royal College of
Art, Thomas Demand
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Location
Rome
https://www.domusweb.it/en/architecture/2013/11/12/caruso_st_john_demand.html
14/11/2013